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Tennis

Australian Open: Nadal soldiers on

The Australian Open kicked off in Melbourne today with 32 men’s and 32 women’s matches. Rafal Nadal walked over his Dominican opponent Estrella Burgos, but at the women, Venus Williams didn’t make it into the second round

Rafal Nadal
Rafal Nadal Reuters/Charles Platiau
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Rafael Nadal powered himself into the Australian Open second round Monday.

The Spanish world number one suffered a knee injury at the end of the 2017 season, and he entered the first 2018 Grand Slam of the year without playing a warm-up event.

In spite of that, he had enough strength to trash Dominican Republic's Victor Estrella Burgos in just 94 minutes on Rod Laver Arena with 6-1, 6-1, 6-1

“I'm very happy to be back, it's a very important beginning for me. It's good news for me," he said, in a post-match interview, pointing out that he had had "no problems" with his knee during the match.

"I want to enjoy every moment I'm here on this court."

In the women’s tournament, second seed Caroline Wozniacki also needed only straight sets to win over Romanian Mihaela Buzarnescu as she searches for her first Grand Slam crown.

But there was bad news for veteran Venus Williams.

She was stunned by Swiss star Belinda Bencic, who just won the Hopman Cup with Roger Federer.

Fellow American and US Open champion Sloane Stephens didn’t make it either.

And to add insult to injury for the US players, eighth seed Jack Sock was kicked out by Japan's Yuichi Sugita, while 16th-seed John Isner sent home by Australian Matthew Ebden.

Other big names to fall were South Africa's 2017 US Open finalist Kevin Anderson, who had to give in after a five-set thriller.

Third seed Grigor Dimitrov survived, as did volatile Australian Nick Kyrgios, but not without a code violation for swearing at the crowd.

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